Medlar Lucan

Patchy. And inconsistent. Parts were loud aloud and others drew a big decadent groan. It may just be that to be truly decadent you need to branch beyond the confines of travel experienced by these two fellows. The Japan chapter was anticipated but was disappointing, given the potential available if you allow yourself to wander away from the train lines and allow local burrowing behaviour to take over. The St. Petersburg however, was hilarious.

In terms of unlikely but perhaps true, The Decadent Cookbook beats the recipe for souris a la creme from Farley Mowat's Never Cry Wolf in spades. You can avoid most of the stomach-turning details by skipping the recipes and reading the literary extracts.

Overall, for people with strong minds and stronger stomachs.

A little too clever for its own good.